Month: September 2015

This book analyses postsocialist urban policy. The focus lies on the question of how certain it is that postsocialist Eastern European Cities are approaching the Model of the classic “European City“. The city of Warsaw was chosen as case study. Based on the neo-weberian approach developed by Le Galès, the author defines the characteristics of the European City in the field of urban planning and studies them in relation to the contemporary debate on Governance. The public institutions along with the formal urban policy goals in Warsaw show convergence to the Model of the European City. However in practice, informal processes and negotiations initiated by economically strong parties dominate the urban development in Warsaw. This duality of urban development stands against the Model of the European City. The situation in Warsaw is compared with urban planning processes in Budapest, Prague, Wroclaw, Poznan and Gdansk. As a result, the specifics of postsocialist urban policy and the Varsovian urban development are shown. This demonstrates that there is no linear progression from the postsocialist city to- wards the European Model. Instead, a particular Eastern European type of urban development has evolved.

The social dimensions of river restoration are not well understood especially in the context of large-scale restoration projects embedded in a complex social-ecological system. This study used in-depth interviews with diverse stakeholders to examine perceptions of restoration success on the Clark Fork River Superfund project in Western Montana. Trust emerged as critical to restoration success and was influenced by public engagement, and by spatial and temporal scale. At this large scale, multiple relationships between agencies, NGOs, businesses, landowners, and other stakeholders meant that building trust was a complicated endeavor. The large spatial scale and long time frame made public engagement challenging, and landowners in particular were critical of the project, expressing mistrust in both agencies and the project as a whole. However, projects focused on smaller spatial scales, such as particular stream reaches, appeared to inspire more effective collaboration. Relationships between organizations were important at this large scale, but inter-organizational conflict affected trust across the project. Further, because trust requires accepting vulnerability, recognizing the differential vulnerability that particular groups and communities experience, based on the risks and benefits they accrue relative to the project, is important.

Yesterday I attended at UFZ Leipzig a lectured led by Professor Michael DepledgeDSc, FRSB, FRSA, FRCP from European Centre for Environment and Human Health, University of Exeter Medical School entitled “Human health and wellbeing in an uncertain environment”. See bellow the abstract:

Throughout human evolutionary history we have lived in intimate contact with our local ecosystems. This has involved surviving threats from diverse natural hazards and learning to thrive by manipulating the natural world to acquire resources. Over the last two centuries, however, new ways of thinking have given rise to a vast range of novel technologies that have transformed the ways in which most of us live. A progressive migration away from natural settings now means that ca. 60% of the global population reside in urban, built environments, supported through the exploitation of natural resources. This proportion continues to rise rapidly with important implications for energy use, food and water security and especially waste handling and disposal.

In this lecture some of the interconnections between human activities and global environmental change will be explored and their consequences examined. Particular attention will be paid to the threats posed by climate change, weather, demographic change and emerging chemicals, including pharmaceuticals and nanomaterials. Chemical production worldwide has increased by over 2500 fold over the last 75 years and continues to escalate. Pharmaceutical use is also increasing rapidly. As these chemicals are released into the environment, intentionally or unintentionally, humans and wildlife may be exposed. The accumulation of increasing body burdens of contaminants poses potential threats to health, biodiversity and ecosystem sustainability.

Paradoxically, there are also many benefits to health and wellbeing that can be derived from natural environments. For example, there is growing evidence that time spent in natural settings can be used to promote physical activity and foster better mental health. These may be important factors in addressing the global epidemics of obesity and psychiatric disorders.

Public health programmes such as the Green Gym and the Blue Gym provide examples of the ways in which health benefits can be delivered. Such work raises questions regarding where exactly are the healthiest places to live? In the UK, for example, self-reported health is consistently better in coastal dwellers. Furthermore, there is a global trend towards moving to live in coastal areas. Indeed, more than 30% of the global population now live within 100 kilometers of the sea.

Interestingly, as climate change progresses and sea level rises, it is coastal areas that are most likely to experience more frequent flooding and severe storms, putting the human population at increased risk. The lecture will conclude with a discussion of the difficulties of minimising environmental threats and maximising opportunities through policy development.

The lecture and subsequent discussion raised interesting questions:

Living in coastal areas significantly affects wellbeing, research say. It is important to bring up a previous post where a research says that “individual’s level of personal well-being is strongly related to the level of wealth of the household in which they live”. In this sense, and according to the lecturer research even controlling the wealth of the household, the variable proximity to water is determinant.

Empirical evidence are rarely definitive. i.e. there is always a unobserved reality that does allow for consistent conclusions. This brings up the Popperian concept of falsability, that is, no number of confirming observations can verify a universal generalization, such as All swans are white, yet it is logically possible to falsify it by observing a single black swan. In other words, theories may be acceptedprovisionally, but neververified. In this context, the discussion raised the question “how (scientist) to communicate uncertainty” and, in turn, be credible.

Moreover, the lecturer starte talking about the risks the climate change infringe to our lifes. Some of them are the cost of having benefits on other hand and he raised the question: “what is an acceptable risk?”

Finally, the concept of “environmental empathy”. Do people living in urban areas has more or less environmental empathy? Is the fact of being in touch with nature a determinant variable of environmental empathy? It is logical to think that a person that benefit from his/her contact with nature will tend to have more environmental empathy. However, what is the concept of nature? For some people nature may mean “dangerouos snakes” or threatening wild pigs.

“Relationship between Wealth, Income and Personal Well-being, July 2011 to June 2012”

Summary
This article uses data from the Wealth and Assets Survey (WAS) for July 2011 to June 2012
which, for the first time, included measures of personal well-being. It describes the results of
regression analysis considering the relationships between the total wealth or total income of
the households in which individuals live and their personal well-being. Regression analysis is
a statistical technique which was used to analyse variation in well-being outcomes by specific
characteristics and circumstances of individuals while holding all other characteristics equal.
This allows for a better understanding of what matters most to an individual’s personal well-being
compared to analysis when different factors are considered separately.
Main points
• An individual’s level of personal well-being is strongly related to the level of wealth of the
household in which they live. Life satisfaction, sense of worth and happiness are higher, and
anxiety less, as the level of household wealth increases.
• The levels of household income are less strongly related, with relationships found only with life
satisfaction and sense of worth.
• The net financial wealth of the household appears to be the type of wealth most strongly
associated with personal well-being. In particular, life satisfaction will be higher in households
with greater net financial wealth.
• Levels of property wealth and private pension wealth were not found to be related levels of
personal well-being.

Historicism especially as expressed in the work of Wilhelm Dilthey, immediately preceded the sociology of knowledge. The dominant theme here was an overwhelming sense of the relativity of all perspectives on human events, that is, of the inevitable historicity of human thought. The historicist insistence that no historical situation could be understood except in its own terms could readily be translated into an emphasis on the social situation of thought. Certain historicist concepts such as “situational determination” and “seat in life” could be directly translated as referring to the “social location” of thought.